Sunday, March 27, 2011

Caution: kills ahead...

Well, it looks like more people are trying to level pacifists, now that it's quite a bit easier with herbalism and mining XP and Archaeology, so it might be a good time to recap all the obscure ways you can get credits for a kill...

First, of course, grouping with anyone who kills anything counts as a kill. Even getting a portal from a mage can give you a kill if he zaps something while you're grouped.

Second, the tagging rules (a mob "tagged" by you will count as your kill even if someone else kills it) are not always obvious, and they have changed in the past. I think now, any action that draws aggro (except for proximity aggro) can tag a mob, not just damage, so using any non-damage spell like fear or sleep can tag a mob as yours, so you can only use these safely when in an instance.

Third, some things count as kills that aren't obvious; removing NPCs trapped by webbing counts as killing the web, for example, and destroying a nest in the Throwing Down quest in Northrend also counts as a kill by itself. And if the Headless Horseman sets you on fire during the burning town event, if you kill a low-level player or critter because of the fire coming off you, it counts as YOUR kill. Oddly enough, the Absorbent quest in Azshara doesn't count as a kill if a water elemental is killed by your aura. Other quests where you destroy something might or might not count, so if you can, try it with another toon first.

Forth, with a lot of tiny critters running around, try to get into the habit of gathering items behind you; you can gather, but not attack this way, so it reduces the chance of an accident.

4 comments:

NPC you can talk to, follow the conversation and its revealed as an alliance spy, it will then attack you. I tried to run away but it got killed by some NPC guards and that counted as a kill.

Desolace, early adoption quest http://www.wowhead.com/quest=14246Seems simple enough, place egg into nest wait for bird to come. Few mobs spawn and easy to kite them around until the bird turns up. Need to do this 3 times, first 2 no problems at all on the third one though one of the mobs that spawned managed to aggro a nearby mob. The spawned mob lost the fight and because I had to attack the spawned mobs to get them off the egg it counted as a kill for me. As you need to get aggro on the mobs to get them off the eggs its best to avoid this one

Lastly Kingslayer Orkus. NPC that gives a nice quest chain, but after you hand in "The Road to Purgation" Orkus will become a pet, even if you dont accept he still follows you around. Venture too far on the island and he will go running off killing alliance, and yup they count as kills. Leave the island and head to mainland and he will vanish before you reach the murlocs.

- Quests or interactions that spawn mobs - these are often pre-tagged to you and even if you don't kill them, other players or npcs might be able to kill them and land you with the credit.

- Pets, Guardians and Minions - Beware using any item which creates a creature that can attack or be attacked as you can be landed with kill credits for stuff they kill and possibly when the minion is killed.